Cowboy Not Included: The Boot Knockers Ranch, Book 6 (2 page)

“And you do ours good with all that fantastic five-star cooking. What’s on the menu tonight?”

“Pickles and pickled onions. Homemade, of course.” Her eyes twinkled.

“Of course.” He navigated the back roads leading to the main highway.

“Oysters.”

“Oooh la la.” He waggled his brows at the aphrodisiac food none of the Boot Knockers really needed to get it up.

She punched him in the arm. “Scoundrel. Do you ever think about anything but sex?”

“Not really. That and hot sauce pretty much rule my life.”

“You and your hot sauce.”

“Please tell me there’s something spicy on the menu.”

“Bison striploin with sweet potatoes.”

He considered the food. Finally he nodded. “I reckon I can dump hot sauce on the bison.”

“You wouldn’t! It’s the best cut. It melts in your mouth.”

He laughed and placed a hand on her thigh, which she smacked away. “Oh all right. I guess I’ll have to go a day without the nectar of the gods. And I’ll enjoy every bite.” He smiled at her until she blushed. Then they talked about normal ranch operations for the rest of the drive.

When he let her out at the grocery store with the promise to pick her up in half an hour, he was in good spirits. He loved his job and the people he worked with. But as soon as he walked into the air-conditioned, stodgy bank to make his deposit, he felt a weight steal over him.

He was making a deposit for a child who didn’t know him. Findlee. His throat closed off as he thought of the little girl he’d left behind. If only things had been different with Skye…

“Deposit all of this.” He pushed his check across the surface to the teller.

“Yes, sir.” She always got flustered when he came into the bank. A middle-aged woman with lines around her eyes and mouth, but a nice color to her skin. It reminded him of Skye’s a little, though his ex’s complexion was more perfect than an airbrushed model’s.

To distract his thoughts from Skye, he said, “You changed your hair.”

The teller looked up, surprise in her eyes. “I’m wearing it different.”

“Looks mighty nice,” he drawled.

She blushed and he gave her a crooked grin that kept the pink hue in her cheeks all during the transaction. When she pushed his book back to him with a new sum in the bottom, he winked. “Thank you. Have a good day.”

“I will.”

He left the bank knowing he’d given her a little ray of sun in her drab day serving customers. Women deserved to know they were beautiful and interesting. Early on he’d realized how happy it made him to make a lady’s day.

It had bugged the hell out of Skye, though.
Maybe I am just a bastard.

Why was he thinking about her? She’d cut him from her life without even giving him a chance to explain himself. Hell, she hadn’t even let him take the dog.

He stomped down the sidewalk, staring into shop windows. Insurance agents, health food stores and a Christian bookstore. He slowed as he passed the jewelry store, thinking of how damn long it had taken him to get enough money for Skye’s engagement ring and wedding band. Now he could walk in and buy a dozen sets if he wanted to.

Was she seeing anyone? The idea of her in a serious relationship made his stomach cramp and his fists curl. He didn’t want to think of his daughter around another man. But what could he do? He’d been granted visitation in the divorce, but he’d never used it. He’d felt like the worst husband ever, and no doubt he was the worst father too.

I could visit on my next week off.

He scuffed his knuckles over his trim beard and continued past the jewelry store, unable to look at those sparkling beacons of hope for another second.

None of his friends on the ranch even knew about his daughter. Saying her name hurt him too bad.

Pushing a breath through his nose, he went into the boot store and browsed for a few minutes.

A pretty little country girl asked if she could help him, and he gave her a smile he didn’t feel. “Just lookin’.”

She toyed with her hair and told him to holler if he wanted to try anything on. With a glance down at his boots, he realized why he was holding on to them. It wasn’t because they were molded to fit his feet after years of wear. It wasn’t that they still serviced him and a good cowboy treasured his boots.

It was because Skye had been with him when he’d purchased them. She’d gotten a pair too—a sweet little pair of brown ones with rhinestones up the shafts.

He shook his head. He couldn’t buy a new pair, not today while she was so rampant in his thoughts.

When he picked up Cook at the grocery store, he put on a mask of happiness that didn’t reflect his emotions. They sang another duet and chatted all the way back to the ranch, and by the time he reached the iron gates with the letters BKR, he was ready to face a new week of beautiful ladies he could make smile.

Chapter Two

“Don’t get off the potty yet, Findlee.” Skye gave her best I’m-not-kidding-kid look and glanced back at her tablet screen. Her daughter had been sitting on the little plastic pot for less than three minutes—there was no way she’d performed.

In the background
Sesame Street
played on TV, annoying high-pitched voices filling the house. Ignoring them, Skye swiped a finger through several webpages of Texas ranches.

Of course they didn’t list ranch hands’ names, and surely that’s what Booker was doing for work. When they’d met he’d been baling hay for her uncle. God, he’d looked damn fine in nothing but a pair of Wranglers. Just a sweaty chest full of muscles and a little dirt on his face.

The grating noise of plastic on tile sounded, and she looked up to see Findlee using her feet to scoot herself and the potty across the room.

“Car, Momma.”

“Go potty, Findlee.”

Why didn’t Skye just use the emergency phone number Booker had provided before skipping town? One phone call and she could tell him everything in her mind—
I want you to see Findlee. I want you to know what an amazing child she is and how she looks like you when she smiles.

That familiar tension coiled tight in her belly. She stuffed down the feeling and considered taking up her phone. One call and she wouldn’t have to face Booker, at least until he agreed to visit Findlee.

But she’d done too much evasion already. Why hadn’t she let him speak his piece after his two-day disappearance? At the time it seemed like self-preservation. Hearing from the lips of the man she loved that he’d been with another woman would have cut deeper than guessing. She didn’t want to know the woman’s name or what they did together. Besides, she’d been a sleep-deprived new mom, and seeing straight hadn’t been her strength.

Tossing his junk onto the lawn and refusing to listen to his tall tale had been her first step in taking control of her future. Yes, slamming the door in his face had felt right—then. Now it felt childish. An adult would have discussed the matter.

She wanted to do that face-to-face and not over a cell phone.

She glanced up to see Findlee doing a bare-butt dance to Elmo and laughed. She’d go potty when she was ready and not a minute before. Most likely it wouldn’t hit the potty but she’d cleaned bigger messes.

Skye direct-dialed a friend who worked for the state child support office. They chatted for a few minutes about mutual girlfriends and what was going on in their lives. Then Skye did a little begging and asked her friend to look up the name of the bank where Booker made his deposits.

Armed with the knowledge and glad to have connections in good friends, she started a full-blown search. The town in Texas catered to ranchers with a feed store and a huge tack warehouse. When she searched the outlying areas for ranches, she saw it.

His photo on a home page.

Her mouth went dry. He was lined up with about twenty cowboys—all shirtless and wearing jeans, though one was in leather pants. Still, that man had to be Booker. She’d know the cocky set of his shoulders anywhere.

The Boot Knockers Ranch. What was it? A male strip show?

Enlarging the picture, she stopped breathing. There he was. Except now he was so much…more. He’d packed on muscle in his chest, arms, thighs. And his jeans rode so low that she could see a ring of muscle just above.

He wore the same hat as he had when begging her to trust him. How had he managed to keep the straw from falling apart?

His face was too shadowed to get a look at his eyes—the only way she’d know if he was truly happy.

With a rough sigh, she sat back and rubbed her hand over her face. Her nerve endings were singing a tune she knew all too well. Her body craved him. His touch, his kiss. God, she missed his scent.

It had been too long since she’d seen him. He hadn’t set eyes on his little girl in ages. Did it bother him or was he just adhering to Skye’s wishes to stay away?

Either way, she needed to be over Booker. He wasn’t what she wanted for her future—just her daughter’s.

As Findlee did several spins to a new song, Skye entered the website.

It had a mature audiences rating.
He’s definitely a professional dancer.

Something hot and unwanted blossomed in her chest. All those women looking at him, lusting after him.

Stuffing dollar bills in his Speedo.

Let the Boot Knockers fulfill your wildest fantasies while showing you just how beautiful you really are.

Hell, she had plenty of fantasies. She’d married too young and didn’t have time for all the fun her girlfriends had experienced.

Heart tripping, she flipped through page after page of the ranch. It wasn’t until she saw the pages of cowboys to choose from that she understood.

The knowledge smacked her hard and she sucked in a harsh breath. He was…a prostitute?

No, a sex therapist. And there was his damned smiling face and a bio underneath.

“A born and bred Texan, Booker knows how to treat a lady with a wink and a tip of his hat. He specializes in sex toy therapy. If you crave a little more adventure in the bedroom, he’s your cowboy. Be prepared for rope-play.”

Oh my God. Who is this man?

Yet the biography was spot-on. He’d always been such a flirt. And she had the toys in her nightstand drawer to prove he did specialize in battery-operated fun.

The rope was new, though.

What about the other cowboys? They surely handled rope too.

Bleary-eyed, she watched Findlee do several more revolutions until she swayed on her feet and plopped onto her bare butt. Skye felt equally as dizzy.

One glance at the prices for a week’s therapy made her sputter an expletive. Thankfully Findlee was too engrossed in her show to repeat the cuss word.

Skye went back to Booker’s page. So this was what provided her daughter with food, clothing and a roof over her head. Exactly what did a sex therapist do besides…well, have sex? And how could he do this every week?

After researching their application process, she saw how careful the ranch was to select a certain type of woman. All operations looked on the up and up. Health checks, interview process. If they couldn’t help you, they let you know.

When she pulled up another man’s profile, the room grew a few degrees hotter. Whoooeee, he was a beautiful cowboy. Rugged with a sparkle in his eyes. And tattoos. Mmm. Booker didn’t have tattoos but Skye had always loved them.

Upon closer inspection of the man’s photo, she saw gold glinting on his chest. Nipple rings.

She flipped through five more profiles before she felt too hot and agitated to go on.

The ranch specialized in women with all types of problems from the inability to climax to cherries that needed popping. It also helped women with self-esteem issues and plain old loneliness.

That was her summed up in a shot glass—lonely. She didn’t have time for relationships.

Again, she studied the fees. It was a shocking amount, but she had the money. All that overtime at her crappy retail job could be used on a trip to the ranch. Definitely more fun than Bora Bora with her friend Suzanne. She’d have her own hot cowboy as a companion.

And she could find Booker and speak to him face-to-face about being present in Findlee’s life.

The little girl was sitting on the potty watching TV again, allowing Skye minutes to peruse the site. She took her time filling out the application and snapped a selfie to use as her required headshot.

Then she spent several more minutes finding just the right cowboy for her. They wanted her to select three, but she’d be happy with any of them. Well, not with the sandy-haired Dom named Quay. He frightened her a little. Giving up all that control? No, she just wanted a fun romp and a week without diapers.

She typed in the names of two cowboys—Finn and Elliot. They had the right amount of sex appeal with brackets around their mouths that said they smiled a lot.

Looking at Booker’s unsmiling mouth and that dangerous glint in his eyes made her shiver.

No, she would not put his name there because she wasn’t going to be tempted back into his bed. She only wanted to talk to him about Findlee. Besides, if he had all this fun with women every week, she deserved to have fun with a new man too.

In the end, she left the third choice blank and hit the Submit button. If she was selected, she’d take her mother up on that offer to babysit and spend a week being wined, dined and sixty-nined by a gorgeous hunk of man.

And she’d see Booker. It was time to set things right, for Findlee’s sake.

“I pee!”

Skye tossed aside the tablet and jumped up. Findlee’s little face was glowing with pride. “Oh my goodness, let me see,” Skye said.

The toddler stood and sure enough, a few drops were in the bottom of the potty along with a small toy she’d tossed in.

“Good girl, Findlee! You did it! Now you can go—” Pee ran down her daughter’s thighs onto the tile.

“I pee again.”

Skye looked at the ceiling. She couldn’t wait for that vacation.

As the lights dimmed, Booker slid into the big leather chair in the front row of the auditorium. The energy on selection day always ran high, but today the cowboys seemed to be in bigger spirits. Several of them flipped through their files containing all the women clients and discussed who they were meant to fight for and who they hoped to steal.

The ladies were selected by their office personnel but sometimes things skidded off track. Hormones took over and they ended up fighting for a different woman based on a gut instinct and lust.

Booker’d had his share of moments but not today. He was more than satisfied with his lady of the week. He didn’t need to look at the others in the file.

“My woman’s got the most perfect skin. Like a model’s. I can’t wait to give her a pearl necklace.” Finn made a noise with his mouth like a machine gun.

“You wish you shot that way. I’ve seen you in action. It’s more like a dribble,” Booker drawled to several guffaws.

Hugh, boss and master of games, took his place in front of them. He folded his big arms and gave them his sternest look. “All right, cowboys. Remember—”

“Hands off your buttons and peckers in your pants,” they chorused.

Shaking his head and grinning, Hugh moved off to the shadows with his lover, Riggs.

The first lady stepped onto the stage. Tall and blonde with thin limbs. Booker could almost guess that in her youth she’d been teased for being tall and awkward. Gangly, even. But she was a prime example of the kind of woman who felt a drastic change in her life after a week at the ranch.

One of the Boot Knockers asked her a question, but Booker tuned it out. His mind was on the woman with the great skin Finn had mentioned. When Booker thought of great skin, he pictured Skye. How many nights had he lain in bed staring at her in the moonlight, aching to take her but knowing she needed her rest before the baby awakened to breastfeed?

The woman answered the usual questions in a shy voice. Name, needs. When a Boot Knocker asked if she preferred fingers or tongue, her face turned a dark red and her breathing grew rapid.

Then she released a giggle and the ice was officially broken. “Tongue, of course.”

Several cowboys pushed their buttons for her, but only one walked her off the stage. Then the second woman took her place.

Three more and Booker only kept half an ear tuned to them. His lady was number eight.

Buttons were pushed.

He leaned back in his chair and let his mind wander. Ranch chores were already done, and his muscles still hummed from the exertion. He loved it here. His work and friends were great. It sure beat working two crappy jobs in a city. And long ago he’d made peace with himself. Even if he couldn’t talk himself back into Skye’s house after two days, he knew what he’d done.

Getting his brother out of an apartment full of meth-heads and into a rehab had been much higher on his list of priorities than sleeping in his own bed or earning a day’s minimum wages. His brother had his life to show for Booker’s efforts. That was something.

Out of the shadows offstage stepped a woman with short brown hair. Golden highlights accentuated the waves that would be curls if not kept so short. The spot lit on her.

Booker stopped breathing.

He dragged his gaze up her body. From those worn brown cowgirl boots with rhinestone shafts to curvy legs, denim skirt, white tank top… He stopped on her face, his heart thudding to a halt.

Jumping to his feet, he gaped at the woman. Skye.

Finn pushed his button without asking a single question, and several others followed. Booker jerked into action. He stormed the stage and leaped the three feet onto it. Skye’s warm brown eyes widened and she stumbled back a step.

“What the hell are you doing here, woman?” he grated out as need stampeded through him.

She threw up a hand to ward him off. “Booker, I’m a paying customer.”

“Fuck that.” He grabbed her around the waist and plucked her off her feet. While he stomped offstage to some resounding boos from his colleagues, he endured several sharp kicks to the shins by those little boots he’d bought her.

“Dammit, stop that.” He set her down and grabbed her upper arms to keep her from bolting.

Her jaw was fixed in the way that reminded him of the last time he’d seen her.

He growled. “What are you doing?”

“I’m on vacation. Now let me go. I have a cowboy waiting for me.”

“Like hell. You’re not going to be in anybody’s bed.” He lifted her again and hauled her down a short flight of stairs and through a door to the outside. They spilled into the sunshine and he got a good, long look at her.

His throat closed and his heart pulsated. She still took his breath away, damn her. She stared back, eyes wide and lips parted. Her chest rose and fell, pushing her full breasts against the neckline of her tank top.

Defeat washed over him, towing him deep in a despair he hadn’t felt since she’d shoved him out of her life. “Why, Skye?” His voice sounded as if he’d swallowed spurs and chased them with whiskey.